Chevy Finds New Roads With Zumobi

Mar 1, 2013

Website Magazine Staff

Content is king - a popular phrase proven repeatedly.

In the case of mobile media company, Zumobi, content was the leading catalyst for impressive results out of a recent mobile initiative for the Chevrolet Technology Series campaign. The promotion was a content advertising experience that ran across Motor Trend's print magazine, website, iOS and Android Apps.

"We presented Zumobi with a challenge to preserve the creative elements of our print and online campaign to create a cohesive brand identity across mediums and yet build a unique experience that addresses the specific usability and content aspects for mobile," said Carolin Probst-Iyer, manager digital consumer of engagement at General Motor's Chevrolet Division. "They far exceeded our expectations on mobile. The results of a 37 percent engagement rate are a testament to the success of this campaign and the ZBi platform."

Zumobi Co-Founder and Vice President of Product Design John SanGiovanni credits three different reasons for the success, including the aforementioned content.

"This campaign was really about trying to engage the user with content and teach the user about their manufacturing, so their goal was specific: engagement with the site," said SanGiovanni. "Chevrolet wanted a car enthusiast to really spend real time and watch the long-form videos and engage with other excellent content."

And engage they did. People spent as high as 6.4 minutes interacting with the Chevrolet ZBi ads and a low 4 percent bounce rate. SanGiovanni counts the actual integration of the experience as the second reason for the campaign's achievements. Chevy's advertisements weren't presented as an in-app banner. Instead, the ad displayed like a new content channel that captured the attention of the user and subtly integrated brand messaging.

The third thing that affected Chevy and Zumobi's success was the time-release of new chapters of content. The additional content gave users a good reason to use Zumobi's Footprint feature, which creates a leave-behind app on their mobile device home screen, so they can revisit the content at any time. Once saved, the companies could still get valuable analytics from the users, such as session times, the number of people who saved it on their home screen and so on. Nearly 7 percent of users saved the integrated content experience to their home screen using this feature.

It should also be noted, that Chevy's advertising agency, Detroit-based Commonwealth, played an integral role in this campaign.